JOIN USIndia-UK FTA: New Delhi should only agree if concerns addressed
The United Kingdom, it appears, would like to have its cake and eat it too. Grappling with post-Brexit turmoil and in search of fresh pastures for economic cooperation, the UK has been extremely eager to ink a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with India. However, as a measure of reciprocity, it appears unwilling to concede to New Delhi’s demands on migration and mobility issues.
At least this is the impression conveyed by the UK’s home secretary Suella Braverman in her recent controversial remarks with regard to an open borders migration policy with India.
The 42-year-old is no stranger to controversy. She is an unabashed admirer of the British Empire, often singing paeans to it and describing it as a “force for good”, among other things.
Braverman is also a backer of her predecessor Priti Patel’s plans to pack off asylum seekers crossing the English Channel to Rwanda in Africa. She has been famously quoted as saying recently in a rather vicarious sort of way that it’s her “dream” and “obsession” to see asylum seekers being flown to Rwanda. It’s a plan that had to be put on hold earlier this year because of legal challenges.
Therefore, the freshly minted home secretary – she has completed just a month in her new job as part of the Cabinet of new Conservative Prime Minister Liz Truss – utterances on Indian migrants come as no surprise.
Expectedly, they have not gone down well with New Delhi. While negotiations for trade deals can be prolonged and vexatious, Braverman’s remarks—in an interview with The Spectator magazine barely a month into her new job–have queered the pitch.
To quote what she said in the interview, Braverman said, “I have concerns about having an open borders migration policy with India because I don’t think that’s what people voted for with Brexit.”
On whether greater visa flexibility as a quid pro quo for the free trade deal would be so bad, Braverman said there could be flexibility for entrepreneurs and students. Then added for good measure, “But I do have some reservations. Look at migration in this country – the largest group of people who overstay are Indian migrants. We even reached an agreement with the Indian government last year to encourage and facilitate better cooperation in this regard. It has not necessarily worked very well.”
The Tory politician’s views seeking a reduction in the number of migrants coming to the UK are well known. The irony, though, is unmistakable, given that the Indian-origin Suella is herself the offspring of immigrants, and the family has long been part of a country, access to which she now wants to limit or deny to others.
To be sure, Braverman’s parents came to the UK “legitimately”, as the home secretary puts it -- the Goan father from Kenya and the mother from Mauritius. But then India too is seeking a ‘legitimate’ route for its professionals in the UK as it negotiates the FTA.
That Braverman has chosen to lash out at Indian immigrants just when the UK and India are in the midst of finalising an FTA has certainly muddied the waters and cast a shadow on the proposed deal that both sides had been hoping to sign by Diwali this year.
It was a deadline set during Boris Johnson’s tenure as PM when he came to visit New Delhi in April this year. But it now seems unlikely that this deadline will be adhered to even though Truss is believed to be keen to ink the pact, especially as the UK looks for stronger trade and economic ties with countries outside Europe post-Brexit.
Truss would do well to realise that the proposed deal cannot be a one-way street. She will need to satisfactorily address New Delhi’s expectations on migration and mobility for the FTA to come to fruition. To do so, the British PM may need to override her home secretary’s reservations on migration issues.
Clearly displeased with Braverman’s observations on illegal Indian migrants, the Indian High Commission has said that action has been initiated in all the cases referred to it of those overstaying in the UK without valid visas.
A bristling Indian mission also reminded Whitehall that it’s still waiting for “demonstrable progress” on the Migration and Mobility pact that was signed by the two sides in May 2021. New Delhi has already made it clear, and rightly so, that “all negotiations are a part of give and take and there are elements, it needs to be a win-win for both sides”.
The UK needs to understand this if it wants to push closer trade and economic linkages with nations outside Europe. It would also do well to realise that it cannot get a trade deal without keeping in mind Indian interests, among which are issues centred around migration and mobility. India, too, should not agree to any deal, even a watered-down one, as is being speculated may be signed unless its concerns are addressed.
Needless to say, it’s an issue that has long bedevilled otherwise robust bilateral relations. The matter of visas for students had cast a long shadow during the then PM Theresa May’s visit to India in November 2016. India’s demand remains the same as it was then – greater mobility for its people. The UK would do well to remember this if it seeks to forge closer economic ties with countries such as India. The days of the rapacious British Raj are long dead and gone.
(The writer is a senior journalist)
Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.